Three Loves
by demens-rose
Summary: Doc has asked Wyatt to leave one too many times to be ignored. Here are the thoughts on the departure. DocWyatt,mentions of a historical person not in the movie, and not one mention of Mattie are found here.
1. Chapter 1

Tittle: Three Loves

Pairings in this chapter: Wyatt/Doc, Wyatt/Urilla, in a brotherly/non-romantic way Wyatt/his brothers, and Doc/Kate.

Warnings: Wyatt's POV, stream of consciousness for the most part, implications of dirty things between both a man and a man and a man and a woman, and its a little depressing.

A/N: This is my first story! Yay! Um, I have no beta reader...Not yay. Please be gentle, but say what you need to. I can take criticism. Enjoy.

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This is the hardest thing I've ever had to do. My boots click on the constantly, completely clean floors of Doc's Sanitarium. Each new step makes my feet feel more and more like lead, weighing me down, willing me to halt. I trudge on. I have to no matter how down right difficult it is. I have to walk my way out of his life. He's asked me to do so each time I've come to visit and with each return reminded me of what he said. This time was different.

This time I could see it all leaving him. I watched as he held so desperately to his voice, his mind, and his life. I don't know which he'll let go of first. The nurses say some days he's delirious; so, I guess part of his mind is already gone. I don't know if I could bear to see him like that. It would hurt. Hell, seeing him as he is hurts. It hurts to Watch him breathe as if with each breath a part of him dies, Watch him look at me with those soft, sad eyes that some like him should never have, Watch him try and shake the look of pity I know I give him sometimes even though I would never intentionally look at him that way, and Watch him accepting maybe even anticipating his own death. It hurts more than anything should.

I glance as I walk and see the people here. Broken. Dying. Alone. I don't want to leave him here like this, like them. I remind myself with each step that I have to. He asked me one too many times for me to pretend he didn't mean it. He asked me to leave him for her. To leave the man I love for the woman who is already everything I've always wanted to be. 'Josie' is grace, freedom, and everything I want except love.

I've had three loves. First is the love of my brothers. That can never be replaced. No one can ever match Virgil, Morgan, Warren, or James even though my two other loves almost did. My second was Urilla Sutherland. She was everything I proposed to her day after day and with each refusal reminded myself that there was always tomorrow. So day after day I asked and day after day she said "no" and then "yes". Once, she asked about being out west and said that she wouldn't be the reason I was unhappy by making me live with her. Living with her was happiness. The day we discovered that she was with child was arguably the happiest day of my life; it was followed far too close by one of the worst days of my life. She was dying from Typhoid, and I was helpless just like now with my third love. There is one difference. With her, I had the cold comfort of knowing I was there. I cared for her and washed the sweat from her body. I held her as she let out her final breath and cried as her body went cold. I had the comfort of being there at death with my brother Morgan also but not with him. I have to leave my love to strangers, because he asked me to. He asked me do the one thing that I never wanted to do, but then again he made me feel things that I never wanted to feel.

With my other loves, it was always pure. I had pure brotherly love for my family and pure loving thoughts for my wife. For him, emotions burn. A few times I had to think as to whether I really loved him just because of the way emotions play with my mind. When he was at his weakest, when consumption forced him unconscious or drinking left him senseless, was when I wanted him most. I wanted to take him from Kate, who may have been able to care for him a bit better due to her experience doing so, and only part of me wanted to do so to care for him. The other part was a beast telling me that this was the only time he would let me do what I want. If I drank (thankfully I don't), I know I would have taken him. The times Kate was absent were the hardest to quell. I would care for him then usually all night. Watching him and knowing that the second Kate reappeared he would be hers again made me want so badly to prove tat I could do everything she did and so much more, but then he would cough blood or breathe far too shakily and remind me that he was too fragile in this state. Each time I would say that when he recovered I would have him, but when that happened she was back or the burning emotion had gone. And now when the burning love is under control and has become the pure love like my others, he asks, no begs, me to leave.

_ "Please?"_

That word almost broke me and would have if I stayed long enough to hear it again. How I found the strength to stand is a mystery even to me. I looked down at him begging like he never should, crying like he never should, and dying like I had deluded myself into believing he never would. I had to leave then, but not before I said something to mean everything.

_"Thanks for always being there, Doc."_

It wasn't what I wanted to say, but a confession o love wasn't what he needed to hear. He didn't need to know that even though I am going to a beautiful woman who, I will spend my life with and can make me happy , I'm just like his cousin. I can never love anyone so completely, so base and animal-like, so fulfilling and core. He didn't need to hear that. He needed an ending with a promise that it wasn't mine. It was his and his alone. Damn him for being so selfless.

Selfless wouldn't be the word most would think of when they thought about Doc, but it was the only word that truly describes him around those he cares about. He cared for his cousin and refused to let her be a widow. He left the east for her, I'm sure. God knows he doesn't care enough about his health to leave his Georgia for Texas based solely on it. It was her happiness that he left for. But I guess his intention got twisted, and she joined a convent. He cared for Kate believe it or not. It was the reason that he instigated so many fights with her. He was hoping maybe this time she would leave him for good and find a way to be happy, but again his intention was confused. Thus the next day or month, Kate was back with forgiveness and smiles and offers of things that I had to stop myself from doing while she was away. Eventually he left her, chasing me. Now, he's even pushing me away because of his selflessness.

I wish he would be selfish this once and let me stay with him. Let me help him even if there's really nothing I can do. I wish he would be selfish so I could be.

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Concluding A/N: I do plan on a second chapter of Doc's telling of this moment when Wyatt's leaving. In fact it is, for the most part, written. It just needs to be typed and betaed...Anyone? Please? I'll love you forever? No? Well, that's okay. I'll just try my best to fix my own stupid errors and sentance fragments. 


	2. Chapter 2

**Title**:Three Loves

**Pairings in this chapter**: Doc/Wyatt, Doc/Mealinie, Doc/Kate, and in a loving but not-at-all sexual way Doc/his mother

**Warnings:** Doc's POV, hints of sexy things with all genders, stream of consciousness again, and a bit sad.

**A/N**: So, it appears I'm posting this without a beta reader. So, forgive any mistakes, but do feel free to point them out.

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This may be the most painful thing I have ever done. I watch him walk out of what is left of my life and see as his steps visibly slow. For an instant, I fear my plea has fallen to deaf ears, and he will soon slow to a stop and return to me. He steps as if his legs were made of iron, but he trudges on thankfully. He walks slowly, yes, but with intent. This is for the best. No matter how painful, I am obliged to make certain he finds the woman he loves, his "Josie". That is why I continue to tell him that I neither anticipate nor want his return even if his appearances have been the only things for me to cling to like a child, the only things left to live for. However, he must leave me.

I know how it feels to lose someone at the fault of this disease, because I watched my mother slip away as I tried in any way to aid her. I also know how poorly he responds to the loss of someone close for I saw him hollow and without life the days after Morgan's murder. I will not allow such pain to come to him due to me. He cannot lose me. So, I will "lose" him even if the pain of knowing I will die here alone and without compassion tears at my chest in ways that make the consumption killing me feel like a passing cough. I must let him go to the woman who can love him for the rest of his life as I am quite obviously unable.

I have cared for few, and of those few I have only loved three. The first love has accompanied me as long as I can recall and most likely from birth. My mother was everything to me throughout childhood, and I did anything to be her everything. Her death almost took me with her, and when my father choose to remarry a mere three months after, I almost sent him to explain to her. I would have abandoned my family then had it not been for partly my schooling and primarily my second love. Mealinie Holliday was happiness. Words for us would only make our love appear to be a trifle. Then I was told of my plague, the same one that stole my mother. The doctors said the west would be best for my health, and Mattie's future relied on my decision. After my inevitable demise, she would still have life. I would not alter that life from pleasure to mourning. So, I went to Texas and then a string of other places with names I do not care to recount. That string led me to a love of an altogether different kind.

I had always known what I wanted especially when it came to love. From my mother, I wanted affection and caring. From Mattie, I wanted marriage and children. From Wyatt, I still cannot say what. At each instance that I attempted to put it to words I found myself uncharacteristically speechless. I cannot even say when it was I wanted a thing at all. All I know for certain is that along my long line of places and events Wyatt went from stranger to annoying lawman to familiar acquaintance to someone to pass the time with to friend where by accounts the relationship should have stopped progressing. Alas, it was to go further still and complicate me more. Soon I found myself thinking of him in unholy ways. At first only when Kate had fled and I had consumed far too much bourbon. Then only when Kate had departed or I had a drank a bit too much. Finally in my very dreams when neither Kate had parted from me or I had been drinking excessively. Far too many times I awoke with a start to see Kate's face instead of Wyatt's before I recalled that my dreams were not reality. Soon after that the thought was always with me, and I found myself tracing with jawline with my eyes or admiring his strong back and shoulders. I did my best to dismiss these notions until I could no longer deny it. This dismissal had caused the exact moment I first loved Wyatt to be lost.

I do, however, recall the exact moment I first thought of telling him. It was just after one of my far too long card games in Tombstone's oriental. Wyatt arrived after, what was it? Eighteen, twenty-four, or thirty-six hours? Regardless he arrived and tried to convince me to depart, but he did not force anything upon me as my impossible woman forced alcohol down my throat. Seeing as I was very drunk and exhausted, I am hazy on details, but I do know that I insulted Ike Clanton somehow. He in turn threatened me then Virgil, and Wyatt was forced to break up what would have been a fight had it been anyone braver than Ike, which is not much of a distinction at all. However, I do remember with disturbing clarity falling to the floor with blood running from by mouth after having just informed Kate that I was in perfect condition. I remember lying there as she shrieked what I can only guess was my name. I was too weak to decipher words, open my eyes, or inform anyone that I was in far too much pain to be truly unconscious. Then I was being lifted. I haven't an idea who held my legs (Morgan perhaps?), but I do without doubt know that my head rested against Wyatt's chest. It made complete sence to tell him as he carried me to my room where he would no doubt be the one to care for me as Kate screamed at him or me or the situation in general. I wanted to tell him then and there no matter who it was that would clearly be able to hear me. If I didn't drink (thankfully I do), I might have found the strength.

This instance was also when the looks of pity started. It had been the first time anything quite that bad had been witnessed by him, and thus unlike my Hungarian she-devil who knew to pretend nothing was wrong and defy the doctor's orders just to prove this, he hadn't the foggiest how to act about me afterwards. At first he could hide his looks of sorrow for me well enough, but as time wore on his concealment wore out. Now when he visits, pity is almost a default expression. Though I suppose it's selfish of me to expect to be seen as an equal in the eyes of someone who can walk away, who has a willing lover, who still has a life to live.

Being selfish has always been a forte of mine. When my father remarried, I selfishly opted not to play a role in their affairs. When my dear cousin begged me to not listen to the doctors and stay with her, I fled for the west hoping she would forgive me and carry on with her life. Now I selfishly refuse to let him watch me die as I know he wishes. I refuse to drag him to hell emotionally as I sink there physically or spiritually I suppose. Once again I behave selfishly with hope of forgiveness at a later date. I do wish that he can find a way to forgive my selfish refusal of his selflessness. He must be happy for me to be, and this is the only way. Irony always has the last laugh it seems; for me to be happy, I must send away the things that make me so.

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**A/N**: So that's that. No reviews so far, but that'll change, right?

**Historical Notes**:

There is a debate as to whether or not Urilla Earp died in childbirth or of typhoid. Obviously I like to think it was typhoid.

There is also a debate as to whether or not Doc died in the sanitarium or a glenwood hotel. Although, we're pretty sure it was the hotel. Never the less, for this story he dies in the sanitarium.

Wyatt Earp was not there when Doc reached his end. In fact, he didn't even know Doc was dead until at least a month later. It is to be said though that it couldn't have been a surprise since Josie's remarks of the two's last encounter states that Doc looked very bad.

"Mealinie" was just doc's cousin's nun-name. I forget what her real name was...


End file.
